Dance With The Devil

The Janitor’s Key

Zain and Elena didn't run to a high-tech bunker. They ran to the one place the "Bloodhound" wouldn't look: the basement of the City Records Office, a place of dust and forgotten dreams.

"We can't stay here," Elena hissed, checking the photo on her phone again. "If Dante found us at the safehouse, he’ll find us here in an hour."

"He won't," Zain said, stopping in front of a heavy steel door that had been welded shut for a decade. "Because we aren't staying in the office. We’re going beneath it."

Zain tapped a rhythmic code on a rusted pipe nearby. Tap-tap... pause... tap.

Slowly, the door groaned. It didn't open outward; it slid into the wall. A man stepped out, holding a mop bucket and smelling of cheap floor wax. He looked about seventy, with a cap pulled low over his eyes.

"You’re late, Architect," the old man grumbled. "I almost threw away your reservation."

"The traffic was a bit... crowded, Mr. Cho," Zain replied with a respectful nod.

Elena looked between them, confused. "Zain? This is the man who cleans the toilets at the precinct. What is he doing here?"

Mr. Cho let out a dry, hacking laugh. He reached into his bucket and pulled out not a rag, but a high-end signal jammer that started humming with a soft blue light.

"I don't just clean toilets, girl," the old man said, his eyes suddenly sharp and clear. "I clean up 'accidents.' And thirty years ago, I was the one who built the vault Victor Moretti thinks is impregnable.

If you want to get into the King’s bedroom without waking the guards, you don't use a bomb. You use the man who laid the bricks."

The Street Level: 5:30 AM

Dante Rossi stood outside the safehouse Zain had just vacated. He didn't look angry that they were gone.

He looked intrigued. He knelt and picked up a discarded noodle carton from a nearby trash bin.

He walked over to a small food stall at the corner. Sana, the vendor, was busy stir-frying, her face hidden behind a cloud of steam.

"Impressive," Dante said, showing her the carton. "The noodles are still warm. They left in a hurry. Did you see which way the black sedan went?"

Sana didn't look up. She flipped the noodles with a rhythmic shing-shing of her spatula. "Sedans come, sedans go. I’m a cook, not a traffic cop. You want spicy beef, or are you just here to waste my oxygen?"

Dante smiled—a thin, dangerous line. "You have the eyes of a woman who sees everything and says nothing. That makes you very expensive, or very loyal."

"It makes me hungry," Sana snapped, finally looking at him. Her eyes were hard as flint. "And I don't feed dogs that bark too loud."

Dante laughed softly and walked away. The moment he was gone, Sana reached under her counter and pressed a button hidden inside a spice jar.

"Architect," she whispered into a tiny microphone hidden in her apron. "The Bloodhound is sniffing the trail. He’s smarter than we thought. But don't worry... I sent him toward the North docks. He’ll be chasing a 'ghost' sedan for the next three hours."